


vanishing

by deadlybride



Series: A Perfect Circle [17]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Mild Dissociation, Post-Season/Series 07
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-06
Updated: 2017-04-06
Packaged: 2018-10-15 08:31:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10553264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadlybride/pseuds/deadlybride
Summary: June 2012. Alone, Sam tries turning over every stone.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A Perfect Circle - _Vanishing_ , track five of _Thirteenth Step_

_disappear_  
_disappear_  
_vanish, vanish into the air_

Acacia. Oil of Abramelin. Camphor and salt and crushed petals of anemone, and the candles at the corners and the sigil chalked into the wooden floor. He’s done this enough by now that he’s got it down pat. He slices into his hand, into that stupid useless scar, bleeds into the summoning bowl and lights the match, sulfur striking bright and sharp in the air.

Nothing.

There’s an achy awful pit in his chest. He stares into the corners of the room. He’s been in this cabin three weeks now and he knows it intimately, knows its crannies and shadows, the way the lamplight streams through the air. He’d know, the instant Crowley came. That sulfur stink, a little sharper, covered up with dark cherry smoke. But—no, nothing, _again_ , and he just stands there, blood dripping in steady soft splats onto the floor. He doesn’t understand. He closes his eyes.

The air had rippled. He remembers that. Kevin had been trembling behind him but they were far enough away that they weren’t affected. Cas had looked confused—when didn’t he—and the Dick-thing had been shuddering, old bone curving sickly out of its fake throat, and Dean—

His chest is shuddering, a deep shiver running through him. He’s breathing fast through his mouth and he closes it, deliberately, drags himself back into focus until his jaw aches with it. He tugs the handkerchief out of his back pocket and wraps his palm up, quick and messy. It’s good enough for now.

He dumps the spellwork into the fireplace. It’ll make the fire smell weird tonight, but he’s used to it, by now.

The afternoon’s drawing down into evening, outside the smudged-dirty windows. Another day nearly gone and he has nothing. Nothing.

The air rippled. There was a—a _sound_. Some distant weird basso hum, something he’s never heard. Dick had been smiling, like he knew something they didn’t, and Dean had been focused on the danger at hand, which meant he hadn’t looked over, hadn’t turned, hadn’t smiled, one last time.

Nausea, again, and then that stupid cramping hunger. He wants a drink but he already drank every ounce of alcohol in the cabin, at the end of the first week when the panic kept clawing up his throat, not letting him go. The hangover knocked him out for the whole next day, sick to his bones and puking, miserable, so guilty at the wasted time he couldn’t even feel sorry for himself. Not happening again.

Rufus had MREs in the basement, and cans of chili and corn and beans. He needs to eat. He sits down at the table, instead, and wraps his hands around each other. The bandana’s a little damp with blood.

He doesn’t understand how Crowley hasn’t answered. That summoning, it’s supposed to be foolproof, but—maybe with Kevin’s help Crowley can resist it, somehow? No other demons have come. He tried a crossroads, on midnight of the fifth day, frantic even though he knew what Dean would say, what the cost might be, but the woman took one look at him with pitying red eyes and said _no deal,_ and was gone as quick as she came. He stood there emptyhanded, gut-shot, and no other demons came.

Castiel is gone. He prays every night, just in case. He kneels on the floor next to the couch, hands clasped loosely together and his forehead tucked in against them, whispers voiceless with his hot breath fanning across his own fingers _please, Cas, please, I don’t know if you can hear me but—I need help, I need help, I can’t—if he’s gone, I can’t—I won’t—_ There’s no answer. Every other angel he’s known is dead, or won’t answer, or both.

His stomach growls again, loud. The twist of pain is familiar, but he ignores it. The sun’s almost down and he’s nowhere.

Bobby’s library might have had something that would help, but it burned along with the house and he doesn’t know half the locations of the stashes. Dean did. Rufus probably did, too, but he’s dead. He’s already looked into the Campbell family library, but there’s nothing in it about Leviathan, and why would there be.

He takes in a deep breath and shoves up from the table, the chair screeching over the wooden floor. Outside, the Impala’s parked at a stupid angle up close to the door. The paint’s still scratched up, one headlight still broken, the windshield cracked in three places. He trails his fingers along one deep gouge in the paint, running along it as it streaks up the sidepanel. He opens the door and that familiar creak fills the clearing, and then he’s settled in the driver’s seat. Doesn’t matter how many times he’s driven the stupid thing, it’s still unfamiliar. He settles his hands on the steering wheel, there in the encroaching evening, and closes his eyes.

The air had rippled. There had been that sound. He’d turned, covering Kevin, and then that—explosion, black blood splattering everywhere, and when he turned around the lab had been empty. He hadn’t even gotten a last look. No goodbye, no last bad joke, no touch of his hand or his mouth, curled up in soft, familiar conspiracy.

God, his chest hurts. He props his elbow on the window, covering his face with one hand. The bandana presses in close against his eyes and it smells like old blood, overpowering, nothing like Dean’s skin anymore, and now—now his shoulders are shaking and heat’s rushing up into the back of his eyes and his throat closes up, the dark welling up from deep down, somehow, even though he’s felt hollowed-out empty for the last endless month.

After a while he wipes his face, sniffs hard. It’s twilight now, outside the car. He looks at the cabin through the cracked windshield and he’s not seeing it, not at all. Silent out here, or near enough. He listens to his own breath, coming thick now but awfully steady. He doesn’t want to go inside.

His stomach clenches, the pain of it familiar now. He needs to eat.

He leans over and fishes the box of tapes out from under the seat. Dark enough now that it’s hard to pick out much detail, but he’s known these cassettes his whole life and he finds the one he wants. Zeppelin II. The brown-amber of the artwork is almost invisible under the foggy age of the plastic. He wonders if it’s still wound to about halfway through side two, where they’ve listened to it so often the sound starts to scratch, but Dean says, _C’mon man, it’s got character. That’s how you know you love a song._ Ramble On doesn’t sound right without that little skip in the last verse.

He doesn’t remember the last time they listened to it. He runs a thumb over the smooth plastic of the cassette and looks blindly out the driver’s side window. The car sits empty around him. He doesn’t want to go inside.

**Author's Note:**

> [posted here on my tumblr if you'd like to reblog](http://zmediaoutlet.tumblr.com/post/159255695424/vanishing)


End file.
